ok be gentle on me, I did this bubba style. I recently bought a 1888 trapdoor rifle but have not been able to get the proper equipment to load some rounds for the dang thing. ive got all the proper equipment on back order but as it turns out I lack patients. so I was goofing around with a box of Hornady .457 round balls when it occurred to me that they often shot round ball cartridges outa these things. so... I decided to hand load 5 cartridges and as it turns out this is no small feat!
1. size the cases by hand: this means taking a case and pushing the sizing die in with your hands which by the way was easily the toughest part of the whole process cause the die would go in easy enough but getting it out took some real effort! I found that using a little lube on the sizing die made it come out a tiny bit easier but not by much. I also onley went about 1/8" deep with the sizing die as the balls didn't need to sit deep.
2. prime the cases by hand: this was actually easy, all I had to do was set a primer on the table and push the brass over it with the wide end of the sizing die. (I was careful to make sure the primer was fully seated)
3. weigh out powder: for this I simply used my Hornady pocket scale (70gr by weight). I then put the powder in the case with a small rubber funnel and tapped the side of the case till the powder would not settle any more. I also used a muzzle loading powder measure to get close to the 70 grains before using the scale to make the final touches.
4. wad: using a compression die I pushed a .060 cork wad down ontop of the powder compressing the powder a tiny bit (probably 1/16")
5. seating the ball: using a 50 cal short starter I pressed the round balls into the casing which further compress the powder around 1/16".
picture time!
this is literally ALL of the tools used to make these cartridges: (the brass die is the compression die and the steel die is the sizing die. these both came from wolfs western traders company and are specifically for the 45-70 gov)
here are the five cartridges next to a .457 ball:
I know its silly but I'm kind of proud of myself over these. If they hit paper at 50 yards and don't lead the living heck outa my barrel then I will consider them a success.
thanks for reading
-Matt